


... While scared

by randompandemic



Series: 'I love you' [6]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drabble, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-15
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2018-04-09 12:57:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4349687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/randompandemic/pseuds/randompandemic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As Róisín drags herself away from the destroyed Haven she realises she may never get a chance to tell the Commander how she feels...</p>
            </blockquote>





	... While scared

She stumbled. 

Her knees sank into the fresh snow. Small, sharp crystals of ice, blowing on the wind sweeping across the Frostbacks, cut into her face. Everything looked the same around her. Flurries of white, the husks of old trees reaching out of the snow, the distant howling of wolves. Loneliness. Endless darkness and snow and loneliness.

She forced her body to move. She was so cold, she could barely feel her limbs, trembling so fiercely she struggled to breath. Her teeth were clattering, her breath came in shallow puffs. The only good thing about that freezing cold was that the gaping wound in her side was hardly bleeding anymore. Where blood had soaked her clothes, it was damp and cold now, and every step she took hurt and tore at the wound. 

Tears were freezing on her face, crusting together her lashes, she struggled to breathe against the cold, and through her sobs. 

She would die out here.

She knew that now. She had survived the Conclave, a demon of Envy, the attack of an Archdemon and a terrible Avalanche, just to die alone, wandering around a frozen wasteland in a snowstorm. This was how she would end. Alone and scared. She dragged her self forward on all fours now, crawling, left a trail of blood spatters dark in the fresh snow. Life was draining from her, and the anchor pulsed green on her hand. As if it was trying to keep her going, trying to hold her in this life when she was just about ready to give up the fight. Her eyelids were getting so heavy. She did not want to die, was terrified of it, now more than ever. And she had never even had the opportunity to tell… to tell that infuriating, sweet, beautiful Templar… that she…  

She looked up with heavy eyelids, saw shadows move in on her, their voices distant mumbles in tongues she did not understand. She was surely halfway in the Fade, these had to be demons sneaking up on her, ready to claim her once her heart was done beating. They came closer, one with heavy steps, clanking armour. He said her name, his voice soft and gentle, sp familiar, so worried for her. It had to be a dream shade, there was no question to it. Taking the shape of the Commander, with his halo of golden hair, his warm eyes, his broad shoulders she knew leaning against would feel so safe. 

She collapsed forward, and his arms caught her. They felt so real as they cradled her closer, wrapped her up in his warmth. 

“Maker’s breath, she’s bleeding!” he called, his voice hazy, like through water. What a convincing dream shade he was.

“Am I… dead?”

He looked down at her, his eyes wide and burning. With his teeth, he pulled one glove off his hand, dropped it in the snow and then cradled her face, caressing her cheek gently.

“You are not. You are very much alive, and you’ll stay that way, if I have any say in it.”

“… so cold…” she whispered, teeth clattering. His teeth gritted together and he blinked against the cold, nodding. His arms came closer around her, held her firmly against his body and her eyes fluttered close. If this was death, it wasn’t so bad after all.

“I’ll keep you warm, you hear? I’ll do whatever I have to, to keep you safe.”

She smiled, his fur pauldrons were tickling her face.

“Cullen…”

Her eyes rolled back in her head as she lost consciousness, he felt her body go limb. Alarmed, he turned her face towards him.

“Herald? Her… Róisín? Róisín?!” 

No response. “No! No no no, don’t die, stay awake, stay with me.”

Panic welled up in him. And only part of that had to do with the fact that the Herald of Andraste was dying in his arms. He shook her gently, felt a painful knot in his throat. “Róisín, please… please… I thought I lost you. When you left that Chantry to fight the dragon… I thought I’d lost you forever. I thought I’d never get the chance to… Maker’s breath, I think I love you. I never said that to anyone before. Do you hear me? I love you, and you can’t just die like that, you hear me?”

His heart was clenching as he held her, so cold and so fragile in his arms. He heard the steps of the others approach, Cassandra, Varric, Vivienne ready with her healing magic. He stroked her cold cheeks, his thumb over her lips, and he felt her lean into his touch. 

“Cullen…” she whispered again. He was overwhelmed; tears welled up in his eyes because she spoke, she was still with him, faint as it was. 

“Yes! Yes, I am right here. Just stay with me, Róisín!”

The smile on her lips was weak and she had not opened her eyes.

“… You, too…” she mumbled, he understood only bits of it, so he leaned closer to her lips. 

“What? Róisín, what?”

“Love…” she whispered, breath shivering with the cold, and he felt his heart tear apart with that very feeling. “… you, too.”

She drifted back into a half sleeping state and Cullen stayed dumbfolded when Vivienne took her from him to apply her healing hands. He carried her back to camp than, his coat wrapped around her, held her in his arms as if she were the most fragile thing in the world. And he watched over her as she rested in their makeshift camp. She was alive. And there would be time for the both of them to come to terms with the confessions made in the face of death.


End file.
